Brussels braces as Europe-wide protest kicks off

(BRUSSELS) - Police threw a ring of steel around EU
headquarters Wednesday as thousands of workers in a sea of banners from
across Europe took to the streets amid mounting anger at painful
spending cuts.

Police barricaded banks and shops and blocked
access to the European Union building, where labour leaders hoped to
mass up to 100,000 people from 30 countries in the afternoon to say "no
to austerity".

"We're here to say 'no' to the multiplying number
of austerity plans, whether adopted by governments or by European
institutions," said Bernard Thibault, head of the major CGT French trade
union, as the march took off.

"Our message is to avoid adding an unprecedented social crisis to the financial crisis, with the workers paying the cost."

Stepping
off buses from as far afield as Germany, Poland and Britain for a march
snaking across Brussels, protestors said they had travelled to the
heart of the EU to show the human cost of budget cuts.

"We must
make ourselves heard," said 28-year-old Polish policewoman Jelenia Gora
after a 20-hour road trip under the Solidarity banner.

"We are
here to tell the EU it must slow down cuts," said German miner Markus
Machmik, 45, part of a group of 100 from the Ibbenbueren coalmine,
dressed in white from hard-hat to boots.

The protest, the biggest
such march since 2001 when 80,000 people invaded the Belgian capital,
was timed to coincide with an EU plan to fine governments running up
deficits.

Detailed proposals of the economic sanctions were
released Wednesday by the 27-nation bloc's executive arm, the European
Commission, ahead of a meeting Thursday of the continent's finance
ministers.

"We will demonstrate to voice our concern over the
economic and social context, which will be compounded by austerity
measures," said John Monks, British general secretary of the European
Trade Union Confederation.

Millions of jobs fell off the European
map in the global downturn and many more look set to be squeezed as
governments axe public spending.

In Spain, where unemployment has
more than doubled, with one out of five workers jobless, the country
battled rush-hour travel chaos and pickets rallied outside factories as
unions launched a 24-hour general strike.

The strike, its first
since 2002, was called to protest a sweeping overhaul of the country's
labour laws and a range of steep spending cuts.

"This is a crucial
day for Europe," said Monks, "because our governments, virtually all of
them, are about to embark on solid cuts in public expenditures.

"They're
doing this at a time where the economy is very close to recession, and
almost certainly you'll see the economy go back into recession as the
effect of these cuts take place."

Across Europe labour leaders are equally concerned.

Portugal's
leading labour confederation, the CGTP, which is close to the
communists, called protests in Lisbon and Porto and hopes for more than
10,000 participants.

Poland's main unions, Solidarity and OPZZ, expected "several thousand" at a protest outside government headquarters.

Similar
marches were scheduled in Greece, Ireland, Italy, Latvia and Serbia,
with labour leaders across the board clamouring for growth and
protesting the injustice of workers paying for the errors of the
financial sector.

As Europe tries to clean up its post-recession
books, a backlash has also begun focused on vast anticipated numbers of
public sector job cuts.

In Britain unions, lawmakers and the rank
and file handed leadership of the opposition Labour Party to
left-leaning Ed Miliband, in a surprise, last-minute defeat for his
better-known, centre-right brother and former foreign secretary David.

"We're a rich part of the world," said Monks.

"We're
going to keep this campaign going, fight for growth, fight for jobs,
fight to protect social Europe. Don't go down the austerity route."

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